Rowntree

RSS Feed

comic for june whateverth

June 18, 2011

Okay, i’m back, finally, though i forgot to bring any jokes with me so, uh, maybe next time. Reference point for the title of this one. Was working on something else but it imploded at the last minute like what often happens. I don’t know, it has not been a good week mentally. Anyway, yeah, good times.

Can you believe this custom framing job someone had done with their print of the Maturity comic? Respect. I am literally taking my hat off to the effort as i’m typing this. Cheers to Tyler for the picture and for the support, it’s very much appreciated indeed.

Speaking of prints, hoping to make an announcement soon regarding such things, regarding the selection available, so please stay tuned…

Like this:

LikeLoading...

Related

This entry was posted on June 18, 2011 at 2:11 pm and is filed under Also, Subnormality.

Bullseye. I think these are the first characters that actually present themselves, name and all, can’t really remember (did the Depressive Future Christmas Space Marine give his name?).
Anyway, beautifully performed, you really hit the spot with introvert’s tendency to be blatantly honest.

If I were Mark (and I am), I would have ended the conversation before the end of frame 8 (where she starts out, “I mean you don’t know anything about me….”) Even by cartoon standards, this conversation is unrealistic to the point of irritation.

i think thats the point, meet cutes are always unrealistic. in a hollywood movie this whole scene would have been resolved right after the first couple of frames (“you like tea? omg! i like tea too! dating montage!!!) but in real life you’ll probably have a harder time of it. and you might have too put up with some bullshit teenage angst diarrhea being flung at you first. but wade through the emotional baggage and who knows, it might be worth it. but yeah, most people would just walk away.

Daww.. that was kinda an uplifting boy meets girl story. I reluctantly admit that I have some saviour complex when it comes to love
In his place, If I didn’t ran away after she started screaming at me, which is the most probable event due to my horrible peoples skills, I’d totally be trying to save her.

Excellent comic. However I’m stuck wondering what a “Vegan BLT” is. I don’t believe such a thing could actually exist. In fact I’m sure it must violate the laws of physics.
Well anyway, I love this look at a person who expects to be let down so she immediately pushes people away. I can totally relate.

I’ve had a “vegan BLT”; the B stood for “brown mush (that tastes alright but has nothing in common with bacon)”. Some day I’m going to get around to trying some other fake bacon varieties, because the things I like about bacon don’t seem like they’d be that difficult to synthesize, or at least inoffensively pay homage to.

It just amuses me that vegetarians and vegans seem to eat a lot of things that resemble meat. i mean, speaking from a barbaric meat eater’s point of view, it’s almost like they’re not really happy with the dietary choice they’ve made so they have to
And as for the genetically engineered pigs, I don’t know about that, though I don’t see any reason you couldn’t harvest a pig’s stem cells and grow bacon from them. Still wouldn’t qualify as vegan, but at least you wouldn’t have the life of an innocent pig on your conscience, if that sort of thing bothers you.

“It just amuses me that vegetarians and vegans seem to eat a lot of things that resemble meat. i mean, speaking from a barbaric meat eater’s point of view, it’s almost like they’re not really happy with the dietary choice they’ve made so they have to”

Oh dear I’m not sure I want to get into this right here and now.

But there are multiple reasons a person may become vegetarian. Be it environmental harm, animal cruelty, or for health. But most often it’s not because ‘ewww meat tastes gross!!! veggie’s FTW’ like you seem to be implying.
Meat is tasty. So plenty of vegetarians eat substitutes while not causing environmental harm, hurting an animal, messing with their diet, or whatever their issue is with eating real meat. Vegetarianism isn’t really about achieving the most tasty meal plan. :s

I agree, meat is tasty. I also think there’s a reason for that, which is that human beings have thrived for hundreds of thousands of years as predators.
I am on the side of vegetarians/vegans when it comes to the environmental issue, and the cruelty to animals done by factory farms shouldn’t be necessary. I believe in only eating organic, free range meat.

a lot of good points about vegetarianism, but i’m of the opinion that it’s all to alleviate a guilty conscience. look at the facts, we’ve been eating meat for thousands of years and at many times i’m sure it’s been essential to our survival, so we evolved to like meat. it’s really good for us. so if you’re a vegetarian then does that mean that you represent a group of people genetically inclined not to eat meat? maybe some are, but there are just way too many vegetarians for that to be the case. plus most of them argue it’s an ethical choice, but if it’s in their DNA not to feel guilty, then why do they? that guilts coming from somewhere, maybe they use meat eating as a scape-goat for there real problems. also probably an irrational sort of guilt, like when children feel guilty about their parents divorce, that would explain why every second teenage girl is a vegetarian. just a thought. don’t know if i’m right.

Insightful as always, it’s just a shame that there are so many people out there who feel like this (myself included). Also, judging by the above comments and notes in this one (i.e. noticeboard), you aren’t having the best of times yourself at the moment. I hope whatever it is blows over quickly for you, and that at least you can always find solace in the fact that people genuinely appreciate your work.

@Mark O’Leary: I hear you, but that doesn’t make that conversation unrealistic. Myself, I’ve tended to get mad when people lashed out at me for most of my life, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve found that I tend to ignore people’s angry tone more and more, and it becomes easier to see past that and get a sense of what’s really going on with them. Age helps, but some people have that knack even when they’re young.

+ Thanks for the comic. Coveys the eternal existential urban-subnormality feeling.
+ I believe that Ethel’s having a magic marker and writing stuff spontaniously on her shirt does make her cool. So she can’t really deny it. MArk is cool too, but he never denies it.
+ Star Trek reference: niceeee.
+ First time commenting. Although your books and some other strips seem better in my eyes, something about this one really speaks to me.
+ Cheers & would love to buy you a beer (or make you vegan BLT) if we were less than 10000km away.

Geez… the whole point of inviting someone to talk with them is that you don’t know them. How else are you going to find out anything about them? Stalk them for weeks? Interrogate all their acquaintances? That’s even creepier.

Of course, it’s also the natural way that things are done on the internet.

This one went onto my facebook feed. I love when Mark turns around in the just-below-center panel. Seems like a keeper to me, but then of course I’m not her. Also, I *liked* the parodic over-the-topness of the conversation. Is there some real that webcomics are supposed to be realistic!? Finally, you should market that shirt, exactly as drawn (i.e., in crazy scrawly marker font). It’s pretty hilarious.

I don’t think that was fair of her, though. “I MIGHT like the right things” would probably have been closer to what he was thinking.

And again, she got really angry that he wanted to find out more about her by meeting with her while knowing very little about who she was – but what’s the alternative? Would it have been better if he had STALKED her for weeks instead, to make sure he knew everything about her before approaching to talk?

Or would the world be better if no human beings interacted at all, because she sees happiness as being a zero-sum game? Maybe we should all retreat into our smartphones, books and games and never converse with another living person, while calculating and scheming to take more resources from the shared pool.

Nice to know the first name, she’s my favourite character. Ethel has a nice ring, it suits her very well. Her facial expressions are pure gold too, you can really feel the pain and how messed up she is inside. Great job on drawing the details, mouth, eye wrinkles, the anger and all. Good art, very solid craft there.

Lollery at “Mr. Tea”, and giving out a bro-hug for the bad mood flyer in the last panel, whatever the reason. Hope it feels better soon.

(Ironically, the bloody thing is exactly why I’ve stopped trying to talk to women. Happens so much you just go, fuck it, have your goddamn tea.)

I disagree with her shirt and her mentality, knowing other people does make life easier. Friends and relationships are what keep me sane and I feel that meeting others who aren’t just trying to get in your pants (which… he may have been) can be a good thing. If Ethel was willing to open up without blowing up I think she could see that.

Her bitter cynicism reminds me of an ex of mine, and ex who I’m glad is an ex. She always used to drag me into romantizing our depression and overthinking menial things. People really aren’t that bad if you are open to meeting the right ones. That’s not to say it is easy, because putting yourself out there makes you vulnerable. So… not easy, but possible.

And on the subject of this conversation being “unrealistic”… I don’t know that I think so, sometimes hurting people explode on unsuspecting strangers, I’ve seen and experienced it. And Mark actually does start walking away, he’s bothered but curious about this bitter girl. That’s the trap though, he can’t fix her and he needs to realize that the same way people who date people like that do. She needs to fix her.

And this is a lot of analyzing for fictional characters… but I just thought I’d share..

So cynicism with no advice is better? It may be trite to encourage someone in those exact words (“I know it’s hard, but you can do it.”) but there are other ways of encouraging someone with the same message without putting it so simply.

Wow, this sounds exactly like the kind of thing my boyfriend says on a regular basis. I just keep reminding him a) he’s not as worthless as he thinks he is and b) as a matter of fact, I love every second that I’m around him. There’s no happiness being “sacrificed” here.

Yes, people will take first impressions. You treat older people differently than you’d treat kids, you treat someone who might mug you differently than you would someone in a suit. You can’t live in the world without having an internal model for it; believing otherwise is trying to deny your own nature, out of some misguided sense of nonconformism. If you appear to be like X, people will assume you are X, until you prove otherwise! That is what appearance means! This is at its most irritating when it is voluntary appearance.

It doesn’t mean that reasonable people will stick to those first impressions. If I were asking the character tea, that is because I have a good impression of them so far — and I would want to know how well that correlates to reality. Is the company of this person what I want?

The arrogance of her assumptions put me off enormously. I don’t want to make my life easy, I want to make it interesting! Her aggressiveness in acting within her own first impressions of the interlocutor is hypocritical!

I’m with the guy who would left her talking to herself; I have better uses of my time, alone, than putting up with this flavor of bullshit.

I feel like the conversation they had, while not realistic in real life, fits Subnormality’s repertoire just perfectly. And I have to admit, though I’ve certainly had similar thoughts to Ethel’s, I would probably jump on the next guy that admitted to making and liking vegan food. Ethel is obviously in a bad place, but she’s still resisting the typical rom-com-inspire romance that many people try to force into their lives to make their relationships seem more picturesque and “adorable.” Of course this is coming from a single gal, so I’m just bitter, right?

I agree with you, but I don’t believe those little moments are “artificially adorable”. If anything, Ethel is lashing out because the guy’s nice gesture doesn’t fit in her mental pattern of “people suck”. As soon as someone doesn’t fit into her mind-filter, they’re automatically shot down so their ordinary reality doesn’t disrupt her comfortable pain.

I believe that being bitter yields no results (or at best you meet someone who’s as bitter as you and that’s even worse). Misery loves company, ecetera.

I used to be like Ethel, and I don’t believe other people should sacrifice part of their happiness to prevent someone else from self-destruction. There’s a word for that, it’s called selfishness. I kicked that habit years ago and now I make a killer veggie BLT (yes, guys like us do exist).

Not saying you’re a forever-alone crazy bitch. Just saying don’t be like Ethel, don’t give up and when opportunity knocks, answer the door. With tea.

The casual “Meet Cute” is what a writer does when he needs to express a love interest between two characters, usually when they first meet. It’s almost always done for movies because the writers only have 2 hours to fit the entire story into. By having the characters connect (usually in a “cute” way), the audience understands that there’s something between the characters and the story can progress from there.

The common ways of a Cute Meet are:
Being initially shy or angry at each other, bumping into each other, being embarrassed by each other such as see the other party naked or learning a personal secret about the other.

For me, nothing is more fulfilling than character development. I personally get joy out of seeing the people I’ve come to know change and grow. Love’ed this issue. Please, keep ’em coming, it’s one of the few things I look forward to.

God forbid he’s a time traveler, hoping to check out a painting, using a magic walnut to do so…

This week’s comic is just annoying. Ethel is behaving like the most unpleasant person imaginable, and the pseudo-philiosophical drivel about how it’s unfair to assume anything about anyone makes it worse. (Besides, it’s just amazing how overly dramatic she behaves – it’s unbelievable, and just bad writing, Winston.)

The fact that Mark behaves like a docile jerkoff doesn’t make it better. In the end, it’s too easy to develop a heartfelt loathing for both of the characters, and the message of the comic (if there’s any) is just too fuzzy, which is why the ending means nothing to me and leaves me with a hollow feeling.

Daniel, I agree with you wholeheartedly. I would have cunt punted this jerk….even though I’m a girl, I can’t stand the way she’s acting. It’s not that funny at all. I have liked almost all the comics up until this one…it was a disappointment. After she yelled at me like that, I never would have bought her the tea or decided I wanted to meet her after all. If this was a man yelling at a woman, I bet most of these comments wouldn’t be so postitive.

I want to post an at least partial defense of our characters. For one, I think it’s fair to say the Ethel is not mentally stable. She tells scary stories for a living. Anyone who reacts like that to a simple request is probably scarred towards men, people as a whole, or, more likely, strangers. And by extension, I think her logic is wrong, and I’m am almost certain that the author is not trying to promote her view of things.

As for Mark, “Docile jerk-off” is not the vibe I got. I know that if I got stuck in such a situation, I would just try to back out of it and avoid her, and I think that would be a rather typical response (as opposed to a “cunt punt”).

But comics, nor fiction in general, are about what you would do. If they were, everything you ever read or watched would be frighteningly boring. I think Mark possesses something neither of us would have expressed – pity. I think he detects her horrible emotional state, and decides to give up on effort to get a date and instead just try to help out this person who is so unhappy. And ultimately, that’s what this comics is about: helping people. And not physically, mentally, or financially – helping people emotionally. The least we, and Mark, can hope for is that Ethel is a little happier after this interaction.

Ethel’s alter ego-chick in panel #9 is also smiling, though in a more naïve, heart melting fashion. Ethel, herself, could very well be some sort of a Skepchick**. Yeah! She’s definitely not part of that world wide heeling mafia.

This story takes on a whole new layer of meaning if you imagine Ethel as a real prostitute instead of a surreal streetwalking story teller. I went back and reread her debut comic. With the exception of her performance, she was unable to look her John in the eye. She holds her Johns in contempt, and you can see that contempt bubble to the surface when she meets anyone who is fool enough to like her, who buys into her hustle. It’s sad.

Re: SUBNORMALITY:
Computer was ill for a few months, yes much better now thank you, so I realized I was way behind on your work and sat and just luxuriated in it, to the tune of maybe sixty installments or so. And when I was done … I was sad. More, I want MORE! No matter how much you do, it’ll NEVER BE ENOUGH!! I suppose what makes it hard for you is, you can’t be imitated. Even apprentices are out of the question. But that’s not my problem, it’s YOURS! Love ya insanely — now get back to work!!!

I’ve read a bunch of comments from people expressing how horrible Ethel was acting through the strip and I just want to say fuck off.
We’ve all had horrible days when we just want the whole damn world to die. I’ve been having too damn many of those days myself lately.
And what we’ve all secretly wanted is for someone magical to come by, see us at our absolute worst, most outrageously offensive and violently angry and to accept it, to understand it and just maybe to see through it, to hope that maybe despite all that victriole that the strange person they’re meeting is actually just damaged, hurting and needing some kindness and compassion.
We’ve all wanted that person to come up out of nowhere and help us at our worst and I was nearly brought to tears seeing even a fictional character meet that magical someone.
Sooooo…. yeah…..
Probably said more about myself than I should have.

Say what you will, tell everyone to ‘fuck off’ (and in turn be incredibly rude), but I honestly don’t think there is anything at all that justifies lashing out at total strangers in such a dramatic manner. I can sympathize with Ethel’s feelings, but her actions here are simply awful.

Maybe the “fuck off” could have been rephrased, but i think the point was still well made. I’m just happy that there are people defending both sides– that the comic wasn’t just cut and dry. And i’m really kind of comfortable that some people aren’t sympathizing with Ethel here, to be honest. I’m liking the idea of allowing myself the freedom to have some characters not be likable 100% of the time (not that i’m gonna go out of my way to make them unlikable…). To me this was a comic about someone who’s unhappy, and how it makes them act, and, i definitely wasn’t trying to suggest to reader about how one should interpret it, so i’m actually pretty thrilled with the mixed response on this one. It came from a place of honesty, as have the comments, so Good Times indeed.

(as usual, Best Comments Section Ever, by the way. I’m just so honored that such a good vibe has developed here, and that it hasn’t developed, like a lot of sites do, into one of THOSE comments sections where all the comments read like they were written by the same freaking person, in the same voice, etc. Dissent and Variety are encouraged– even if it means the occasional “fuck off.” Anyway, my point was, y’all are Awesome).

(PS: While i’m here, new comic on the way, i swear, it’s currently Under Production. I apologize for the wait, but once again i kind of lost a few days working on another idea before having to scrap it in frustration. I know i keep saying that, but i keep saying it because i don’t want people to think the slowed production is due to lack of interest on my part or something. Plus some other stuff. New one this week though. Plus a recap of The Play. Plus: an Announcement…!)

Looking back and re-reading my own comment I’m a little shocked at my own behavior (though I am the sort of person to tell someone to piss off on occasion, I’m usually far more civilized in my online discourse).
I think the reason I reacted the way I did was that Ethel’s actions in this strip resonated a little too closely with my own for comfort and I felt compelled to defend her.
I still do and though I think that her actions were reprehensable it is still exactly the sort of action I myself would have given people on occasion if I were caught in the wrong mood, and seeing that particular rant be challenged by someone with a supply of patience that far exceeds the norm only made me appreciate the comic more.
In essence I was lashing out at the negative backlash to the comic because I was hoping someone else would see my point of view, and I did it without even realizing it. Funny how life imitates art sometimes.
Keep up the great work Winston, you take as long as you need to make the comics you do. They are a constant source of inspiration and often hilarity as well. I only wish I wasn’t so broke myself or had a wall of my own to hang a poster on, else I’d have bought every one you offer.

I have read through a nice amount of your cartoons and I just wanted to say, amazing work. They actually have meaning to them and they don’t have a gooey happy center all the time. I love your work, amazing job

Considering all those dog days ahead; perhaps it would be wise entering safe mode.
Why not some sunny, uncontroversial, Nagel-style strip from say L.A. beaches? Or, why not, Côte d’Azur in the Old World?

Reading this comments section, I was struck by how many different ways a piece of art can be viewed. I absolutely loved this comic, but if I was reading a review, or say, someone’s else’s opinion of the comic, there would be almost as many people giving it bad reviews as good reviews.

If I was trying to figure out if it was worth my time or not to read or watch by reviews only, I probably would have decided against. I wonder how I can adapt my reading/viewing habits to more efficiently find the pieces of art that are worth my time.

I actually find myself wondering every now and then if that kind of things ever happen. I mean: meeting someone that could find some kindness on his or her heart to feel like cope up with some of the madness I could unleash at a specific time.

It isn’t a bad thing to keep that hope alive, even if it is in a coma, right?

After thinking about it, I thought maybe he could have said “Then why did you let me have the tea, what did you see in me that made you think I was more deserving of it?”, eitherway it had a nice ending, even if not a completely happy or sad one. I liked that a lot. ^^